The impact of travel

Travelling has many impacts -- on the psychology of the person travelling, the people you meet, the businesses you support, and the energy it takes to move yourself from one place to another.  Most of these aspects are hard to name and analyze until there's been some time for reflection and bookkeeping post-trip.  One of the exceptions is the amount of energy we use in transportation.  As we traverse the globe, I thought it would be a good idea to become aware of what kinds of numbers we're talking about with regard to miles traveled and the associated carbon emissions we'll be responsible for.

A rough calculation shows that over the next 4 months we will be flying 12000 miles, leading to a little over 9000lbs of CO2 production.  We will be driving about 4,000 miles in the same time period leading to 4100lbs of CO2.  To offset this would cost an $80 investment in certain green technologies.  Take a look at www.terrapass.com for the methodology and reinvestment strategies we used.


To give an idea of the scale we're talking about, our household produces approximately 30,000 lbs of CO2 yearly. See http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/emissions/individual.html to find yours and the effect different steps will have.

A word about climate change and carbon offsets.  Go do your research, because the implications of what you believe have large impacts on lots of people.  If you conclude that the earth's climate is changing, then ask yourself if this could be a harmful thing and if we are responsible for it.  If so, we have the moral obligation to be aware of what we are doing and take action to correct it.  Carbon offsets have a wide range of efficacy, depending on the type and exeutor of the offset technology, so again be thoughtful.